Don't Be a Dickinson

If I were a cartoonist, and if I had gone to great lengths to create an author avatar? I would never allow my author avatar to be Such. A. Douche. There’s a difference between “self-effacing” and “self-immolating”. Les’ pose in panel 1 deserves a kick in the nuts. Summer, who has been looking weird all week, at least has an excuse in today’s panel 3: she’s about to explode in laughter at Emily’s–I mean Les’ utter douchiness.

Milking the Joke

Question for snarkers in the Buckeye State: is “selling milk at lunch in the cafeteria” something that Ohio school students are really called upon to do? Isn’t that the cafeteria ladies’ job? I’m asking because Batiuk brings this up again. Though I can imagine helmet-haired, bespectacled teenage Les in a hairnet, sheepishly proffering milk to his fellow students . I bet Bull even intimidated Les to give him milk for free. And if that activity is worthy of a yearbook mention, what about Les’ gig as machine-gun wielding hall monitor? I’ll bet that would impress his bride-to-be!

Note: today’s post briefly went “live” along with Monday’s post. The first few comments below were posted before I caught the error.

The Three Faces of Crazy

In typical Westviewvian fashion, all of Les’ friends are offering unbidden and useless “help” with his Kilimanjaro conquest. First, self-styled personal trainer Bull shows up to whip Les’ pasty ass into shape. Today Crazy Harry offers to loan his precious collection of “comical books about Tarzan”. I think Crazy may have confused “Tarzan” and “Tanzania”. Look for Funky to send Les and Summer off with a shipping crate of freeze-dried Montoni’s pies to sustain them on the climb.

I’m sure you all recognize the delirious kid with the Tarzan comics swirling around his head as young Harold Klinghorn, pre-hat, pre-nickname and pre-drugs, back in those innocent times when his only “high” was Tarzan funnies. The Sunday-strip color gradients and shading do not make him any cuter. We recognize his teenage (and actually likeable) self in the little portrait in the banner. Would anyone not familiar with Funky Winkerbean see today’s comic and figure out that the boy, the kid in the hat, and the old geezer are the same person? Or that the two men talking went to high school together?

Beating 'Round the Bushka

Epicus Doomus
June 5, 2012 at 12:39 am
Panel two [of Tuesday’s strip]  = worst Summer drawing ever?

Well, maybe…that is, until today! What the hell happened here? Looks like TB put down the “Funky felt tip” and went for the Sharpie Magnum 44! Summer’s crudely rendered mug resembles that of an an Egyptian mummy.

Jeffcoat Wayne
June 7, 2012 at 12:48 am
Bull’s gonna help Les train to climb a 19,000-foot mountain? Riiiiiiight. Bull looks like he can’t even climb into the team bus without breaking a hard sweat. Christ, he looks like he’s about to pop a spleen just climbing out of his minivan.

Meanwhile, fat, lumbering, old Bull Bushka is all of a sudden this powerful, bellowing drill sergeant, and for the sake of a “punchline”, Batiuk has un-retconned Les and Bull’s high school history. Today’s strip just sucks on so many levels.